Swapped this shock off the wifes Jamis....I had the regular Float RL but put this on...It's the RP23, seems to work fine....Does anyone see any issues here? Not so sure about tuning and dont know if its the correct application "Tune" wise....It'd eyelet dimensions were the exact same...had to swap bushings but that was pretty easy.

So, just got off the phone with Santa Cruz...asked a few questions, here were the answers:

Q. What's the REAL reason for discontinuing the Nickel and Butcher?

A. They simply were not selling....Seems they sold more low cost build Blurs than high cost build Nickels and Butchers....and that they have lowered the prices a bit of the vpp bikes to further push those models. He added that they were huge fans of the Nickels geometry and shock stroke/rate moreso than the Butcher.

Q. Why do some Nickels have straight down tubes and some curved?

A. The older style,( the 1.0 he referred to it as) with the curved downtube and welded on gussett was considerably more money for Santa Cruz to produce instead of drilling the downtube and welding in a mount. He added that the newer style is a tid bit lighter but gives up a bottle mount. He said the geometry is exactly the same as far as the ride is concerned. He added that there actually are some fans of the block letter design on the new ones. He admittedly added that he liked the traditional italicized letter style better.

Q. Why no 142 rear on these frames but does have tapered head tube?

A. He stated frame was super stiff back there with no links close to the dropouts and the traditional ones open you up to more hubs available at the time of production. He said the DT Swiss 10mm fits fine and works similar to the 12mm Maxle.

Q. Why do some frames come with bottle opener derailleur hangers and some dont?

A. He said there was no good reason for this and that the vendor/bike shop usually has both on hand and to request which one you like. Most do not have the bottle opener according to his words.

Super nice people and great Customer Service.....they are sending me a bottle opener hanger free of charge as well as some stickers,etc.....This is my 4th new Santa Cruz so I guess I'm deserving!

Swapped this shock off the wifes Jamis....I had the regular Float RL but put this on...It's the RP23, seems to work fine....Does anyone see any issues here? Not so sure about tuning and dont know if its the correct application "Tune" wise....It'd eyelet dimensions were the exact same...had to swap bushings but that was pretty easy.

I wish I could fit a water bottle above the downtube, like on V1.0, but my newer version does not have this option. Aesthetically, I like the straight downtube.

I do like the new blocky graphics, on the olive color. Some of the other colors, I prefer the original graphics.

A traditional 135x10 rear dropout is one of the reasons why I purchased the Nickel, because I wanted to mount an Internal Gear Hub, Shimano Alfine-8, on my frame, and this hub only works with 135x10 dropouts. It's a bolt-on hub, though, and I do think that is beneficial over a standard QR hub, as far as lateral stiffness is concerned.

Either way, both versions of the Nickel are awesome. Interesting to hear his comment of how they preferred the Nickel over the Butcher.

Front brake came in today...First time ever that I have mixed components. I went with complete Sram XO drivetrain but Shimano XT brakes. I have XTR brakes with IceTech rotors on a Scott Scale Premium and I quickly realized that Shimano has it all over Sram regarding brakes. I believe the Sram XO 2X drivetrain is much crisper shifting and just as light as my XTR drivetrain on the Scott Scale. Im huge into a perfectly adjusted system too, so thats not the issue with the XTR....Its just not as crisp. So, XT brakes and Sram Drivetrain on the Nickel. After about 10 good long hard stops to mate the pads to caliper, I was doin 1 finger stoppies with ZERO effort with the new XT's. My XO brakes on my Scott Genius and Jamis XCT4 would never do that. Im a huge fan of Sram drivetrains though..... Here's a few shots of my Scotts....

Competetive Cyclist (and the 10 other names they go by) bought out all the remaining Nickel inventory that Santa Cruz had I was told.....$600.00 is a stone cold STEAL for this frame. Im thinking about buying another to have a back-up! Thats 50% off! They will be gone by Christmas, I believe. JensonUSA had the Sram Xo 2X crank for $179.00.....another steal! They have all the Shimano derailleurs on sale as well as XT cranksets for $169.00 too....Makes building up a New Nickel pretty cheap compared to regular retail. I got my XT front brake for $99.00......It was an OE deal that was never mounted but no box.....worked perfect and saved lots of $$$$. BTW, I throw the box away anyways!

Tell me why you chose an internally geared hub over a derailleur? Not knocking it one bit but just curious.....

Have you thought about 650B'ing the Nickel out? Im going to order me a wheelset and see if I like it.....I hear the Nickel is sweet with 650B!

I have had an IGHub on my 29'er Karate Monkey for about 2 years now, with no problems. I really like the clean look of using that hub and no longer killing derailleurs on rocks. If I could put an IGHub on my DH bike, I would. I saw that it would work with the Nickel, and wanted to build something different than the norm.

I'm not 650B'ing my Nickel, I upgraded the rear shock to a 200x57 and increased the travel to 140mm, instead.